DAY 5: London; Kitchener Cliff Notes/London Pre-Game

First of all: fuck, I'm tired--seriously, getting two hours' sleep is way overrated. Second of all, I still haven't made a final decision regarding teacher's college; I'll keep you all posted. And third of all, it's almost that time again--time to hit the long road and journey to yet another Pearl Jam show, #3 of this Canadian tour and the second of three in a row. Kitchener will be hard to top from an energy point-of-view, but the silly acoustic first encore at least allows the possibility that London might top it. (Seriously, why is Pearl Jam insisting on doing an acoustic set? It totally saps the show of its energy; yes, they're also pulling out some really obscure stuff, but wouldn't it be just as effective played electric?) A few predictions: "Release" to open, "Ledbetter" to close (it's been played at all but two of the Canadian shows so far), and either "Hard to Imagine" or "Footsteps" to utterly blow my mind.

I'll write actual reviews of the first four shows on Wednesday, when my life hits a brief, yet very welcomed lull. As far as Kitchener goes, the least you need to know is that the set was stupifying, the "Small Town" / "Daughter" / "Black" trio as trite as live Pearl Jam gets (which isn't saying much, but still), hearing "Baba" will never grow tired and--above all--Matt Cameron utterly owned the show. If you've ever wanted to hear rock drumming at its undisputed peak, order the bootleg...seriously, it was jaw-dropping stuff. With that, I'm off! More later tonight, or first thing tomorrow.